Beyond the virus: unseemly fight on another front in pandemic battle

THE upcoming 73rd assembly of the World Health Organization (WHO) is shaping up to be one of several fronts that is turning the spotlight on China's handling of the current health crisis.

Australia is leading a push to hold an independent inquiry into the novel coronavirus pandemic and, at the same time, give the agency power to act intrusively like a UN weapons inspector whenever there is an outbreak of disease that may threaten global public health. The assembly, on May 17 in Geneva, will also debate the WHO's budget for the next two years and the Trump administration's decision to withhold payments. The annual meeting is to authorise the next funding cycle for 2020-2021 at US$2.4 billion per year; determine the policies of the organisation and appoint (or reappoint) the Director-General. There is likely to be a lot of lobbying on Canberra's proposals. One way or the other, the heat will be on China in the coming months.

As things stand, WHO's budget is likely to stir the most intense debate. In the 2018-19 cycle, Washington's contribution accounted for about 20 per cent of the WHO's total budget - US$237 million in assessed fees and US$656 million for specific programmes. By contrast, Beijing paid US$76 million in assessed fees. Of course, Bejing will be ready to point out that the US is in arrears. Washington currently owes US$198.3 million in membership dues, including amounts owed for previous funding cycles. The usual histrionics inherent in all such debates aside, it would be absurd if WHO's other 193 members cannot make up the shortfall. Indeed, China, on its own, can easily step into the breach as can several others. Given the scale of support schemes introduced by various governments to keep their economies afloat during the pandemic, WHO's annual US$2.4 billion budget is small change.

Beijing will also have to decide how to respond to several suits filed in US courts against it. Missouri became the first state administration to seek damages. And to get around the law that restricts Americans' ability to sue a foreign government, the Missouri suit names the Chinese Communist Party as the tortfeasor. It comes in the wake of seven other class action suits against Beijing that have been filed by private American groups. If any of their claims succeeds, Beijing's hoard of US$1.09 trillion in US Treasury Bills would be an obvious target as it would be an asset within the ambit of US courts.

This rush to lawfare seems to have been triggered by the Henry Jackson Society's controversial report which threw up the idea that China should be sued for breaches of the International Health Regulations in the International Court of Justice, the Permanent Court of Arbitration, the World Trade Organization, or in the courts in Hong Kong, Britain, and the US. The society, a conservative British think tank, points out that the Chinese government's early handling of the disease and failure to adequately report the situation to the WHO breached Articles Six and Seven of the International Health Regulations, a treaty to which China is a signatory and legally obliged to uphold. The society assesses that potential damages against China could run to US$4 trillion from just the G-7 nations.

Notwithstanding the consensus that there's little or no legal basis for suing China over Covid-19, US President Donald Trump, with his eye on re-election, might yet pursue this line of action - which could lead to counter-offensives from China. And this at a time when the world powers should be working together on combating pandemics.